Frank Pallone: “First of all, I think the gentlewoman's previous amendment was about the policies of the President being political. And…”

“First of all, I think the gentlewoman's previous amendment was about the policies of the President being political. And I think this amendment is more political than anything. First of all, as we know, what the underlying bill does is it says that if the President wants to release crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, then he has to put together a plan that would require more leases on public lands. What the gentlewoman's amendment says now is that she makes this retroactive and goes back to the day of the President's inauguration-- again, a very political decision to use that date--and says that any releases from the reserve beginning on the day of the President's inauguration, we would also then have to go back and make sure that we sell or lease additional leases on public lands to cover those releases from the reserve back to the inauguration. So, the bureaucracy of all this in itself I think is absurd. But the point is that she is essentially saying that now we have to lease more public lands when, in fact, there are about 9,000 leases already on public lands, half of which are not being used. The oil companies do not want to pump more oil because that brings down the price. They don't want any releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve because that brings down the price.…”